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We’ve seen a lot of innovative new cordless power tools this year. Some of the new tools are evolutionary – which is okay, and some revolutionary.

Some new tools might invoke immediate “that will really benefit my work!” sentiments, while other releases might only be added to our wishlists.

It’s always hard to sort through which deserve special recognition. Following are some of the best tools that came out this year, among those I have had sufficient hands-on testing with.

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There a few other tools that might have made it on this list, but either they’re not available yet, or I haven’t had a chance to vet them yet. My hope is to plan for an expanded end-of-the-year-update. But until then, here are the top tools I’ve been most impressed with so far.

Note: Tools considered for this post were either purchased, provided by brands as test review samples, or demoed at media events with sufficient time to form a solid opinion. The ones discussed here were all provided as no-cost review samples.

Milwaukee Cordless Stapler

I know, a cordless stapler doesn’t sound very exciting. I must have only fired around 20 staples at Milwaukee’s NPS17 media event, but it was enough to get a sense for what the stapler is about.

You grab the stapler, place some staples where you need them, put it back in your pouch, tool bag, wherever, and continue with your work.

There’s not a lot to fuss with, and when you’re done, it drops from your mind. With manual staplers, your hands will often have lingering reminder that you just drove in 10, 20, 50, or several dozen staples.

With this one, stapling is less of a physical exercise or source or fatigue, and isn’t that what we want to see in new tools?

As long as you’re realistic about what it is – a cordless air compressor with 1 gallon tank – it’ll happily serve your modest needs. It’s a quick trim compressor, likely ideal for small jobs. It can be powered using 1 or 2 battery packs, which is a convenience.

A few years ago, I couldn’t imagine that we’d see a cordless air compressor, but here we are.

Ridgid has come out with some very good tools recently – an expanded lighting portfolio, a cordless router, a brushless belt sander, and there’s more to come.

Makita XDT12 Brushless Impact Driver

Makita’s XDT12 was announced in 2016, and if I recall it started shipping in Q4 last year. I only recently had the opportunity to test it out, and it could very well be the best cordless impact driver I have ever seen, tested, or heard of.

It’s small, even astonishingly compact. Powerful. Its 4 speed ranges and 2 other settings have all the versatility most users will ever need. The brushless motor contributes to incredible runtime.

Dewalt…

There were 2 new Dewalt tools that were in the running for the top 5 selections – the new FlexVolt air compressor, and the FlexVolt track saw. Unfortunately I haven’t been able to test either of them, due to shipping issues. This post was already delayed, and I couldn’t wait any longer for Dewalt to sort things out. I wasn’t able to test either tool at Dewalt’s media event.

Festool’s cordless track saw is really, really good, and I wanted to see if the Dewalt held any advantage or was at least competitive.

Ridgid’s cordless air compressor is quite impressive, and I haven’t seen any reasonable limitations due to its small tank. It’s a compact and highly portable cordless-powered nailer. I’m especially curious about Dewalt’s special regulator, and whether there’s any performance difference to justify its added size and price. I had planned to mention both on equal standing – unless something majorly wrong with the Dewalt came up during testing – with comparison tests to follow.

Top Candidates for Future Testing

Following are some the tools that I anticipate being top contenders for the Q4 update, which will be expanded to feature 10 tools.

Are there any tools you want to nominate for consideration in the expanded “Best Cordless Tools of 2017” followup?

Special Disclosures: There were no “entry fees,” “consideration fees,” or any other monetary requirements, conditions, or incentives. In fact, none of the brands whose tools were mentioned were alerted that this post was planned or in the works.

Ordinary Disclosure: Thank you to Bosch, Makita, Milwaukee, Ridgid, for providing the review samples. (Except for the stapler, which was tested at Milwaukee.)

They mentioned that the vibration could be reduced. My compact DeWalt is the same. There seems to be something about those saws where the motor isn’t inline with the recip mechanism that causes them to vibrate a lot.

I saw something, and will look for it, that this saw was just released to the US market. Both as a bare tool and a kit(I think a battery and charger). Hitachi is also selling their 3.0 Compact Lithium battery for $39.99 and it looks like that price isn’t changing.

Have you (or anyone else reading the comments) tried Makita’s cordless router, track saw, or miter saw yet? All 3 of those are on my wishlist and I’m looking to buy them soon if people rate them highly.

Thanks for the info on this and really diggin the stapler…. just hope Bosch follows suit with one as well as i just went full tilt on the 12v line of their tools over the 18v Hitachi stuff i have… still use it but just like the Bosch 12v gear a lot better !!

The Milwaukee site, which I’ve never used before today, says the 3/8″ Fuel Rachet is available now through Home Depot. Of course, their (HD) site is kinda wankie and didn’t work correctly on this iPhone so no order to my Store for me. Maybe I’ll wait for the Big River to list it.
So who knows. I does say the bare tool is $150. So it least we know a starting point.

Well deserved for Makita, that impact driver is amazing. Even the grip rivals Dewalt’s; it’s just the right size and curvature. The balance is perfect. Very high quality and made in Japan. Very smooth trigger, low noise, tons of torque. I could go on and on.

After using a friends oil impulse impact I just couldn’t see myself buying a traditional impact again. It’s not quite as powerful and it’s about $35 more expensive but the noise reduction makes up for that and then some.

Although unfortunately not available in Australia, I think Ridgid’s 18v LPG heater is worth a mention. If it does become available here, as well as the above compressor under the AEG name, I guess I will be buying into a fourth battery platform.

I purchased the flexvolt track saw, unfortunately I did not buy the tracks because I already owned the corded version. I instantly regretted this as my flexvolt version cuts about 1/16th of an inch away from my other one. I have been waiting almost a month for two new tracks to use exclusively with my cordless saw. I guess it was wishful thinking that I could use the same track with both saws. I was very pleased to see they are producing new blades for it at half the price.

How do you like the Flexvolt Track saw? I currently use a Festool Track Saw but there is no way I would pay their price for a cordless version. So I was thinking about getting the Dewalt. Everyone seems to say the plunge mechanism takes some time to get used to. What are your toughts?

Like I said in my post I owned the coarded version for a couple years now and the plunge mechanism is exactly the same. I do not remember having any trouble getting used to it. I noticed no lack of power when comparing it to my coarded saw but I have never used the festol so I couldn’t tell you on that front.

RE: Ridgid cordless compressor
How long does it take to fill its tank?
How loud is it?
What is the run time on a basic battery?
If you fire up a nailer, how many nails can you fire? If you hook up a simple air nozzle … how long can you air sweep before it drains a battery?

I got burned with ridgid’s 24v line and LSA + free batteries for life program that had no batteries, and find the new x4 x5 18v batteries having long shelf life, and good for some light to medium drilling and driving, but lacking use time for any kind of circular saw or reciprocating work … so I’m curious on actual use time, run time, number of cuts, etc on these new 18v cordless compressors, miter saws, etc

Such a shame about Bosch. I still have their 12v drill and driver…I seem to grab them way more frequently than the milwaukee 12v equivalent. But they have been so slow to create a competetive ecosystem of tools, they are really falling behind. I guess they could benefit strategically from Red, Yellow, and Teal doing the heavy lifting….then knock it out of the park with a whole line of superior compact brushless stuff, but I just don’t see it happening. Part if the reason why I broke into the Milwaukee 12v line (black friday drill/driver set for <$100) is because I know they are going to keep innovating and adding to their offerings.

DeWalt and Milwaukee may receive the lion’s share of sales in the States, but Makita’s the best of the Big 3, in no small part to what you just shared. You hardly ever hear anything bad about the longevity of their stuff, and they’re quite clearly the most innovative cordless tool company around.

Bosch isn’t falling behind they just don’t offer all of their stuff in the usa unfortunately. For some reason they must feel owning Europe and Asia means more to them. To much competition here to make it worth their while maybe, I don’t know. Wish they did do business more here. I love their tools. I own almost all of their stuff they offer here, corded and cordless. Would love to try there new core battery pack.

Jared.
I’ve used the CORE batteries almost daily for months and they’ve been great. For a battery. But what else matters eh?
P. S. There’s a guy on eBay that’s an authorized Bosch reseller and his boxed factory CORE 2 batteries plus charger sell for around $150. I’ve bought several. Can’t even find them otherwise. Weird.

I just picked up the Milwaukee Rlver light. Same problem as you have experienced – the clip magnet isn’t strong enough.

I solved the problem by machining out a little bit of the inside of the black handle, and glued in a neodymium magnet that Home Depot sold.

To do this, I put a flat-bottomed Dremel bit in my Bridgeport (a regular drill press wold probably be fine if you can lock the quill) and raised the table a tiny bit at a time while moving the light grip around to make the cutout the size of the magnet. Locking the quill allowed me to make a flat-bottomed cutout and moving the table up very slowly allowed me to carefully control the depth of the cut, as there isn’t a ton of extra material.

I picked up a Makita XDT12 awhile back and it immediately became my favorite impact driver. Size, weight, and power are hard to beat. So much so that I gave away one of the older ones I had because it could not compare, and was just gathering dust on the shelf. Haven’t found a single thing to not like about it. Which for me is…

Stuart, like you I don’t have a lot of use for a reciprocal saw. But it being the last gift my mother ever gave me it’s unlikely I’ll ever get rid of it. The Best thing I use it for is trimming my trees and bushes using a pruning blade. It’s my best and favorite pruning tool.

I must say, I am really looking forward to using the Bosch saw for trimming some branches soon. I also have an M12 Hackzall from last winter’s Milwaukee rebates that I hope can handle some overgrown bushes.

I have the brushed M12 hackzall and it is definitely good for cutting back shrubbery etc, I have used it for cutting branches up to around 50-60mm. It is a little slower than the M18 but it will do the job.

fred on The Best Hook and Pick Set?: “Moody also make spring hooks and sets: https://www.amazon.com/Threaded-Spring-Tool-Kit-Light/dp/B0026GI62A/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=B0026GI62A&qid=1558784803&s=industrial&sr=1-1”